


Fathers and Faults

by completelyhopeless



Series: Detective Grayson and Forensic Batgirl Case Two [7]
Category: DCU
Genre: Alternate Universe, Case Fic, F/M, Gen, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-28
Updated: 2015-03-28
Packaged: 2018-03-20 02:26:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3633270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/completelyhopeless/pseuds/completelyhopeless
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dick and Jason get some answers from Stephanie. Barbara meets Stephanie, and while one lead might be dead, there may be another suspect to arrest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fathers and Faults

**Author's Note:**

> I am thinking there's just one more part after this. I like that thought.

* * *

“What is it about fathers?” Jason muttered. “What the hell makes them the kind of bastards they are that screw with our lives like this?”

“Fault in our male genes, I think. We may be genetically predisposed to be stupid, and some of them take that way, way too far,” Dick said, trying to move again. “Then again—there are anomalies. My dad was a _damn_ good dad. He just... died when I was too young.”

“Yeah, and then you got stuck with an obsessive alcoholic who taught you to be some kind of freak kid cop,” Jason said, shaking his head with disgust. “It's like we found a club—the deadbeat dad club—and we didn't even try.”

“Babs has a good dad,” Dick said. “And I already said mine was good. Bruce wasn't even that bad. He has flaws, yes. He even has one _major_ flaw, but he's still a good man at heart. I honestly don't know what I think about Tim's dad because the guy is never there for the kid, but he's not that bad, either. There are worse crimes and we know it.”

“Yeah,” Stephanie agreed. She fingered the cuff of the sweatshirt Tim had given her. “My dad is definitely one of those.”

“You said you didn't know how he was connected,” Dick said, deciding to interview the girl where he was since he wasn't going to be getting to his feet any time soon. Besides, this way they kept an eye on the crime scene. More or less. “What do you know that makes you certain that he is?”

Stephanie grimaced. “It's going to sound stupid.”

Jason snorted. “I am spending time with _him._ If that's not stupid, I don't know what is.”

Dick managed a halfhearted glare, and Jason ignored it. “It's not stupidity. He just assumes affection is a weakness, so he'll never admit that he likes to spend time with me. I don't care how stupid you think it might sound—we can swap stories about stupid later. Just tell me what made you suspect your father. It would be good to know why we have all these dead bodies everywhere.”

She nodded, still playing with the cuffs of her shirt. “I don't know everything. I told you that already, though. It's just a bunch of little things, little stupid ones. Dad's always been weird, but he started acting weirder, even for him.”

Dick let out a breath. “I've seen a lot of weird. You're going to have to give more than that because I can picture _lots_ of things that others consider weird that are just... my life.”

“He's got a point,” Jason agreed. “Hell, he's a half-brainwashed would be child assassin with the ability to control other child assassins who became a cop. If that's not weird as hell, I don't know what is, and we all live in Gotham. This city defines weird.”

She sighed. “Dad used to have this compulsion: he made everything a game of clues. Breakfast was a scavenger hunt. Homework was... something you never wanted to do at home unless you liked having it complicated seven times more by him hiding your books or making it a guessing game. He had to have his clues about _everything._ It was annoying, but sometimes it could be fun, and mostly it was... It was just my dad.”

“Clues, huh? Didn't you and Bruce used to play that game as a kid?”

Dick caught Stephanie's wide-eyed look. “It wasn't the same thing. Bruce was a former cop. A detective. A good one. He just tended to turn everything into a case. There were observation exercises, cold case hypotheticals, memorization tables, and a few—a few other things, but none of that matters now or are as strange as you are making them out to be.”

Stephanie smiled at him. “I think I like you.”

Dick tried to smile back. “I wish you'd decided that before you hit me with a metal rod.”

* * *

“I'm not sure I want to know how this happened,” Barbara said, looking down at Dick and then over at Jason. He didn't look happy to be there, but that part of him that was loyal to Dick held him in place when he obviously wanted to be gone the minute he saw other cops on the scene.

“It's my fault,” a girl said, and judging from the hideous color of her sweatshirt, this was Tim's friend Stephanie. “I... kind of hit him.”

“I see.”

“I didn't know he was a cop at the time,” the girl protested. She wrapped her arms around herself, doing her best to disappear into the shirt. “I heard voices, and after what I'd just found in that room, I figured they were involved. That it was worse if they were talking about Tim. So I started to run, but I've been running for a while now and I'm tired and I thought maybe if I got in one good hit—”

“It was two. Maybe three,” Dick said, wincing. “I remember at least two.”

“I take it,” Barbara's father said, sounding less than amused, though she thought she almost was, “that our best lead is now not a lead at all.”

“Well, not exactly. We have Stephanie and what she knows,” Dick said. He hissed out a pained breath. “Though if you came here to talk to someone in that apartment, then it's likely that's now a dead end. Um, literally.”

“Very literally. They were all... dead. Very dead. Really most sincerely dead,” Stephanie agreed, and Jason gave her a look.

_“Wizard of Oz?”_

She shrugged. “What? It's not like you didn't know what I was quoting. You've got no room to talk, tough guy.”

“I'm out of here,” Jason muttered, turning to leave. Dick looked after him, forcing himself to his feet with a groan that had his friend stopping to look back at him. “Damn it, Dick, sit back down before you fall down. Or before I push your ass down.”

“Will sit if you get me to the car,” Dick told him, and Barbara would have protested if her father hadn't grabbed her arm to get her attention. She knew Dick needed a doctor—again—and she figured that he wouldn't go to the hospital, just to Alfred, but at least if he went to Alfred, that was better than him sitting around bleeding internally.

“Wow. It really is like this all the time,” Amy said, coming up behind them. “I wanted to believe someone was kidding when I got the call—but hell, Grayson, someone did a number on you.”

“Me,” Stephanie said, and Amy raised an eyebrow. Dick groaned and Jason dragged him away with him. Barbara would have to ask Dick later what Jason had been doing here when he found the bodies. That was something she figured no one else could get out of him, and her father probably did, too, which was half the reason he'd stopped Barbara from intervening before Dick could go.

“Rohrbach.”

“Sir?” Amy asked, looking at the commissioner.

“Take Stephanie there into protective custody. Barbara had found a connection between the man renting this apartment and the original crime scene, but if he's dead like we think he might be, we have a second killer on our hands. Don't let that girl out of your sight—even if she can take down one of Gotham's finest.”

Stephanie flushed red. “Did I say I was sorry? Because I really, _really_ am sorry.”

* * *

“You are not deputizing me.”

“Oh, come on,” Dick teased. “You'd make a great cop, Jason. Think about it. You've got training and skills and—”

“And hell, no. I am not cop material. I've got a bad attitude and a temper and that training is for assassinations, remember? I'm not a cop. I'm not a hero. I'm not delusional like you are. All being heroic ever does is get you hurt, which you should know by now,” Jason said. He looked at Dick like he might just poke the throbbing bruise on his side, and Dick moved out of reach.

“There is good in you. I know it.”

“If you quote Star Wars, I will shoot you.”

Dick laughed. He couldn't stop the smile at that one. “Come on. We both liked that movie—the original versions of it, at least.”

“Dick—”

“And I'm not deputizing you. I'm a detective, not a sheriff,” Dick reminded him. Jason rolled his eyes. “I just want you to come with me to get Stephanie's father. I want to lock him up now, assuming he's as involved in this as she thinks he is.”

Jason folded his arms over his chest. “This matters to me... why?”

“Your mother?”

“I hate you.”

Dick shrugged. “I could have played the 'follow the lead psuedo-assassin' card, but that one is ten times more effective. Do you really want Stephanie to get hurt like your mom was? Think about that apartment. Her father's involved in that somehow, and if we don't do something about it—”

“Why didn't you get one of your other cop friends to do it?”

“Um, well, first because the only cop friend I have is Amy, and I only met her yesterday. I think that was yesterday. Babs is a forensic tech, not a cop. And Gordon—I'm not sure where I stand with him, but he's got the crime scene. Amy's got Stephanie. You and I get her father, and if Brown happens to get a little roughed up on the way—”

“Fine, fine. You talked me into it. Let's go.”


End file.
